Civic virtue

Closely linked to the concept of citizenship, civic virtue is often conceived as the dedication of citizens to the common welfare of each other even at the cost of their individual interests.

Civic virtues are historically taught as a matter of chief concern in nations under republican forms of government, and societies with cities.

The earliest forms of constitutional development can be seen in late medieval Germany (see Communalism before 1800) and in the Dutch and English revolts of the 16th and 17th centuries.

In the classical culture of Europe and those places that follow its political tradition, concern for civic virtue starts with the oldest republics of which we have extensive records, Athens and Rome.

Citizens were expected to put their private lives and interests aside and serve the state in accordance with duties defined by law.

The advancing rich merchants class emphasized the importance of work and contributing to society for all people including the elite.

[2] Civic virtue also became a matter of public interest and discussion during the 18th century, in part because of the American Revolutionary War.

American historian Gordon S. Wood called it a universal 18th-century assumption that, while no form of government was more beautiful than a republic, monarchies had various advantages: the pomp and circumstances surrounding them cultivated a sense that the rulers were in fact superior to the ruled and entitled to their obedience, and maintained order by their presence.

In a republic, by contrast, people must be persuaded to submit their own interests to the government, and this voluntary submission constituted the 18th century's notion of civic virtue.

In his Reflections on the Rise and Fall of the Antient Republicks, the English Whig historian Edward Wortley Montagu sought to describe "the principal causes of that degeneracy of manners, which reduc'd those once brave and free people into the most abject slavery."

Following this reading of Roman ideals, the American revolutionary Charles Lee envisioned a Spartan, egalitarian society where every man was a soldier and master of his own land, and where people were "instructed from early infancy to deem themselves property of the State.... (and) were ever ready to sacrifice their concerns to her interests."

These widely held ideals led American revolutionaries to found institutions such as the Society of the Cincinnati, named after the Roman farmer and dictator Lucius Quinctius Cincinnatus, who according to Livy left his farm to lead the army of the Roman republic during a crisis, and voluntarily returned to his plow once the crisis had passed.

About Cincinnatus, Livy writes: Operae pretium est audire qui omnia prae diuitiis humana spernunt neque honori magno locum neque uirtuti putant esse, nisi ubi effuse afluant opes....(It is worth while for those who disdain all human things for money, and who suppose that there is no room either for great honor or virtue, except where wealth is found, to listen to his story.

National Socialism, the German variant of twentieth-century fascism whose precepts were laid out in Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf, classified inhabitants of the ideal nation into three main hierarchical categories, each of which had different rights and duties in relation to the state: citizens, subjects, and aliens.

Citizenship would be conferred only on those males of pure racial stock who had completed military service, and could be revoked at any time by the state.

It does not carry with it the right to fill any position under the State or to participate in political life, such as taking an active or passive part in elections.

Those who show themselves without personal honour or character, or common criminals, or traitors to the fatherland, can at any time be deprived of the rights of citizenship.

Furthermore, I resolve to do my duty and live honorably (so help me God).Institutions that might be said to encourage civic virtue include the school, particularly with social studies courses, and the prison, namely in its rehabilitative function.

William Bennett, a Reagan administration cabinet member turned conservative commentator, produced The Book of Virtues: A Treasury of Great Moral Stories in 1993, another anthology of literary materials that might be[weasel words] considered an attempt to update McGuffey's concept.